A year ago? Maybe more? That is when a cat came to my attention.

While I will call him he, I have no idea of the cat’s gender.

He was a gray/white shorthair. One night, late, I stepped into the backyard to get something from my vast storage shed where all my lights are stored. There are six steps up to the entrance door, and a small deck. A cat was on the deck. Just before putting my foot on the first step, I paused.

“Hi, kitty. Who are you?”

A furry tailed thwumped onto the deck.

“You are so handsome!”

Thwump, again.

Slowly, I stepped over, and even slower extended a hand. I expected the cat to bolt.

Instead: Thwump!

Slowly, I brought my hand above the cat’s heads and slowly descended to cat fur. Then I scratched the top of the cat’s head.

Thwump! Thwump!

Oh! What a remarkably docile cat!

So began our little late-night ritual. I never saw the cat during the day but late, after the sun set, he was often in the very rear yard (not inside the fenced cat yard). And very late, I would find him barely visible nestled inside a pile of leaves in a corner. I would bend very low and scratch the furry head top.

Thwump! Thwump!

I loved this ritual.

 

But where had the cat come from? How long had he been hanging around? I had no idea.

Then…one night…the cat was gone. And my life, somehow, felt just a very tiny bit less joyful.

Days turned into weeks and no cat. My smile of expectation transformed into a frown of loss.

Then, after some time had passed, I lost any expectation of happening upon the gray/white cat.

 

A few weeks ago, Justin, while working on my house, said: “A few hours ago, there was a cat in your fenced yard with a badly injured leg.”

Me, horrified: “Can you describe the cat?”

“Gray and white.”

I immediately thought of Gray. I ran to find her. She was on my bed, sleeping. Her leg was fine. I went out to the yard. A lot of cats were about, but no gray/white with an injured leg.

Was the cat Justin saw the missing gray/white which had gone missing a while back?

 

A week later I glanced out the door to my dining room, and there, on the deck in my fenced yard, was THE missing gray/white cat! He was lying down on the big cat pillow. And, even at a distance I could tell that something was very wrong with his left, rear leg.

Stepping outside, the cat looked up to me. I crouched down.

“Oh! Poor baby! Where have you been? And WHAT happened to you”

And then came a barely observable thwump. My eyes teared up. The cat had obviously been through hell.

His leg was obviously healed, sorta kinda, from some terrible injury. Was the leg though broken? Could it be fixed?

I brought out some food just for the cat and he scarfed it up. I gently petted its head. Quiet thwump.

 

I did not know what to do. This question soon became moot as the cat vanished about an hour later. Several days passed before I found it, again, on the deck in my fenced yard. OK, so it was obviously getting about, somehow. And had been doing so for months.

Yesterday I knew: The cat had to see a vet. Likely, there was nothing they could do. But…and this was the BIG question…maybe they could do something to make the cat’s life better.

I got an appointment for 5PM.

At 11AM the cat had vanished again.

As the hours passed I searched the whole fenced yard. No cat. I searched the perimeter of my house. No cat.

At 3PM I cancelled the vet appointment.

At 7PM, the cat was on my deck. He was happy to be fed.

This morning, the cat was still on my deck, nested into a partially collapsed cardboard cat house. I fed him, and then called the vet back.  “I have him! Can I bring him in?”

“We are booked for the day. Can you send pictures of the injured leg?”

And so I did.

 

 

 

 

I fully expect that Limpy will be in his cardboard house in the morning. He will eat…and then vanish till just before dusk.

WHERE is he going, though? WHY does he go?

I do not know.

I do know that I will make another vet appointment, and then put Limpy in my bathroom till it is time to go to the vet.

He will be ok in the bathroom for hours. For, I will let him use my iPad.

 

Limpy is, quite clearly, not a feral cat. He was at some point, it seems, a beloved family pet.

So…what happened?

How did he go from, presumably, a beloved pet to finding refuge in my backyard?

I did ask him about this tonight. But he seems shy and did not respond.

Maybe he will once feeling better.